Your Birth Control Is Not Likely the Cause of Newly High Blood Pressure Measurements

It is possible for the birth control pill to cause high blood pressure, and it was much more likely when women used higher blood pressure. Maybe 5 women out of a 100 will experience higher blood pressure when on birth control pills. Blood pressure problems in pregnancy are due to completely different physiologic mechanisms, and just because you have high blood pressure during pregnancy it is still highly unlikely this will be a problem with your birth control pills. If you are unlucky enough to develop high blood pressure on the birth control pill it was probably due to an individual reaction by the rennin system of the kidney. And once this is turned on it may take a good many months for that trigger to resolve and get the pressures back to normal. If you are already a hypertensive you should be getting close management when on your pills and check ups are recommended by some gynos about every 3 months. The heart is a bit affected by the pill. More heart output, probably due to the excess fluid retention, so the heart works a bit harder. Not a big deal for the healthy, but for those in whom the heart is already challenged, it could become an issue.

Comments

What a timely issue for me!! I am 29 and I have newly been experiencing Isolated Systolic Hypertension with Systolic readings consistently above 150.

My questions is, Who do i see for this? I would love to see my Gyno (you) the ONLY MD I have seen for over 10 years now. Is this something that is better seen by an Internist or Family Practice Doc instead?

The diagnosis of hypertension is made by getting two readings of elevated blood ressure on two separate occasions oaver 6 hours apart. Generally this means getting two visits to whomever is doing your primary care and getting a diagnosis (and at Women's Health Practice I do primary care for many women!). Here is more information regarding high blood pressure from American Heart Associationhttp://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/Conditions/HighBloodPressure/High-Blood-Pressure-ATH_UCM_002020_SubHomePage.jspAfter you get a diagnosis, then you and your health care provider have to discuss first line treatment, and discuss treatment goals as well. The Heart Association does talk a bit about these things too. So yes, anyone with high readings, whether systolic or diastolic, does need to see their doc! Thanks for asking!

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